Interview with Teaism, Khun Gan

Ryan · 0:05

Hello and welcome to the Specialty Matcha Podcast. My name is Ryan. This is my cohost Zongjun, who also goes by Sam. Hello. Hello. And we're the cofounders of Sanko Matcha Products. Yeah, we launched this podcast to discuss our learning journey, Matcha, share startup stories and interview experts. And this episode we have Khun Kan from T-ism to talk about his journey with tea. Welcome, welcome.

Ryan · 0:27

Awesome, awesome. So before we start, Khun Kan, can you maybe share a little bit about your personal and also your professional background about yourself and also about T-ism? So for T-ism itself, I started quite long time ago.

Gan · 0:41

It's probably 7 years ago in Facebook as a Thai artist made of the Facebook basis. Seven years ago. Not many people who really study or into the Japanese tea even much, but I, I did. So I would like to share those learnings they get daily in that Facebook pages and about twos or three years ago I started T-ism in Instagram also.

Gan · 1:10

So I was originally a content creator and I'm really like to experience the tea more in the real world like Kyoto or in Japan. So I decided two years ago to study master degree in Kyoto city, which is not really related to tea. It's about this business administration as an excuse to come to Kyoto and now I working in tea shop in Osaka called Baisar Natamura.

Gan · 1:43

Last year I also got the Nihoncha instructor qualification in tea industry and happened to be the first from my nation who got this. Wow, Wow. Congratulations. Thank you. I know that's very hard to get. It does really.

Ryan · 2:01

I think the barrier of language itself is quite challenging and plus the Israeli textbook based in some way, even Japanese quite feels it's quite hard to get to pass exam for the writing exam. That's awesome, and it's awesome you move to Kyoto just to learn about tea and get closer to it. It's true to tea people.

Gan · 2:32

Yeah, true passion. That's yeah. What actually what inspire you to, I guess kind of like really dive into the world of tea and and also with Japanese tea, like what was the original inspiration and passion came from? So in 2017 in February, I was studying in Osaka and had a trip to Uji and that is time I I drink a cup of gyokuro and it's also the first time I know that there is the flavor called umami in tea and that impact bring me to what I am today I believe.

Gan · 3:16

So before that I was drinking this bottled Japanese green tea is quite common in South Thailand as well. And that was the first time that I know how tea really tastes like, though in that time, that day I bought sencha leaves back home and tried to brew it like Auntie in the in the tea shop brewed.

Gan · 3:41

And it was not really delicious. So I tried to find out how to make it more delicious and try to. I think he was chasing the first experience about tea and during the process I begins to explore more tea and more aspect about tea. I think the process of acquiring new impression in this journey has brought me here.

Ryan · 4:11

It's awesome, yeah. For a lot of people we interview, there's always some moment where they taste something and it's just like just forms this connection and then like sparks a passion. The moment of conversion. Yeah. And chasing that feeling to that flavor. Yeah, I definitely can relate, especially multiple teas across my journey, I think I came across sencha and matcha, I think I was 13 years old.

Ryan · 4:38

I was pretty young and I, that first sip was just so different because I grew up in the, in the states, so, you know, as exposed, exposed to like Earl Grey or black tea. And it was just so different. And it was like, wow, I can't believe what this tastes like. And in a sense, I've been chasing chasing that feeling, trying to try new more and more things that are hopefully give me a similar spark.

Gan · 5:04

Yeah, this is the same reason why I but we have some I and my partner in Phuket, Thailand has a little project about we were going to make a tea shop in Kuge and we name it Shoshin. Shoshin is mean. It's a same word mean the beginner's mind because I would like to remind everyone and also myself to to remember the day that we started drinking tea and start to go into this fold. So in Zen, the beginner's mice may means many things depends on the interpretation.

Gan · 5:43

For me, when we got deeper into something always come with more knowledge as well as bias. So in my opinion, knowledge is something that is structured, but in Zen, if you want to be free from bias and be being more well liberated to worldly things, you have to be live. You have to not struck yourself in those structure. In my opinion, the people who know tea doesn't means that they must learning tea and being an expert to know of to know to really know them.

Gan · 6:28

It's my it's maybe some people who don't know anything but just see that tea and that is the moment they get the real and full experience without the shadow of bias. That is what I think in the tea. So I thought many people who rally into the tea, especially matcha, and they start to come up with some, well, some beliefs about matcha even though it's right, whether it right or wrong, I would like to return them to to see a tea as it is. So that's why I named the tea shop Shoshin. It's like to return to the most pure form of enjoyment without any interventions of the world or things that are not directly related to tea itself.

Gan · 7:21

Preconceptions. Yeah, initial instructor exam that is writing exam and practical exam. In practical exam we have to evaluate the tea leaves by washing and also tapping. So we have to make 5 samples into the order is one has higher quality or vision has lower quality. And I realized that the qualities does not always means deliciousness.

Gan · 7:53

So in tea industry qualities means it has a better materials and thus we can we can buy that tea in higher price. I think the the ideal quality was made to to organize these tea trading and solving problems in tea industry.

Gan · 8:14

But for the deliciousness, I think it's quite subjective and depends on people. You can enjoy the low quality tea as long as you're happy with it. It doesn't mean that it does not delicious. So delicious is more something in your mind more than on your tongue. Yeah.

Ryan · 8:36

That's a great way of putting it. I love, I love that phrase. It's actually something we talked a lot about on this podcast because like ideas about quality might not translate to preference because I've served a lot of people like very umami, what would be considered very high quality matcha, at least in Japan.

Ryan · 8:56

And when you serve this to some American audiences or even some audiences in Europe, like in France where I live, it's rare actually that I think that some people who especially don't have very much exposure to tea, that they like it.

Ryan · 9:11

Most people actually dislike it. Like if you take something like a Narino that's very umami, very strikingly umami, and you serve it to, I'd served it to some some friends here in Paris, they didn't like it. And it's an interesting question, especially with the matcha boom and more and more high quality Japanese teas being exported.

Ryan · 9:35

I fear that the industry is too focused on traditional quality versus other flavors that, you know, people might like in Thailand and the United States and Europe and South America in the Middle East and a lot of these new markets where we're seeing this culture form. Outside Japan, people don't doesn't always make tea with hot water.

Gan · 9:59

When they drink tea, they might they may drink in a different way and has different idea about what is the delicious tea for their own menu. So they think tea industry in Japan also would like to understand well, the customer, the end users in five countries. So I don't know that some tea shop in Uji also start tasting the tea with milk rather than apart from boiling water or standard way of tasting tea because they would like to understand why end user in in overseas prefer this match are over the Ottoman.

Zongjun · 10:42

So I think we we're going to see many changes. Yeah, yeah, agree. I mean, we've seen like traditional tea houses like Horii Shichimeien that formulates matcha that's, you know, optimized for mixing with milk, which was pretty interesting to watch.

Gan · 11:00

And they are clearly adapting to the new trend. Yeah, yeah. They are one of the most traditional producers in this town. Yeah, yeah. Yes, indeed, very. Progressive. Also, we're really big fans, especially of Narino. Narino and Nario, Yeah, last year was a big change. Because of the matcha shortage or because of something else? So last year I was a student in master degree about business. So I, I did interviews my producers, seven of them in Kyoto, to see how they react with the shortage. And it was March, so it was before the spring harvest, which the shortage is mostly, well, the most serious at that time. So I explored the landscape of

Gan · 11:56

this industry and they found that by the scale of the company and by the form of the business that has a different idea. So in this industry, there is the people who grow the team is farmers and there's people who buy the primary products, which is what we call Aracha from farmers and didn't blend it and go grind it into matcha. And we also do have people who just buy, buy the matcha from this blender and sell that to foreign market. So the scope of may varies by the company but we start to see more farmers who has a direct trade of the tea with the with with end user in foreign country not only but traditionally they will send the tea originally

Gan · 12:54

they will send the tea to the blenders. There is many reason for that is because the grinding process mean a further investment for them. So some of them the capital is limited to the production of aracha. They can use aracha or tencha, which is a much of materials. They can use the tencha factory that is not that owned, but owned by some like common tencha factory or sometimes factory is owned by the blenders with some bound that they has to sell that tea to that blender.

Gan · 13:32

So that there's some relationship like that that they cannot they cannot sell to the foreign country only they had to balance this relationship when they like to when they sell, they can sell more by themselves directly.

Gan · 13:49

And the change is that when the Masha was getting popular, it was autumn in 2024. Four. Yeah. So it was after the first harvest. So the farmer already sold a tea, but the blenders was benefit get the benefit from selling. The tea.

Gan · 14:12

Stock get back from the farmer so last year we can witness the great increase in the material of matcha because of the shortage itself as well they don't have any tencha for finding and because of the farmers. I feel like, I feel like they feel that they they should get something from this mushroom, not only the blenders.

Gan · 14:39

Because they sold it before the shortage. Yeah. And even the Ministry of Agriculture in Japan, they promote the policy to convert tea fields were growing sencha into a tencha. So more new investor in this in this industry and we will start to see more mature in the market even whether it's in Japan or outside Japan, regardless of the quality.

Zongjun · 15:13

No, it's interesting. It's an interesting, it's an interesting dynamic as it seems like a very new business model to either go direct to consumer to having a actual farm sell tea to a consumer or sell tea to a brand that will then like a Western brand that will label it.

Gan · 15:32

But it seems like the wholesale system in the auction system are very sticky because they control the infrastructure of tencha processing and the milling and issues. So what do they think about the fact that there are very few choices if they don't own their own tencha processing or their own ishi-usu? Well, they're plus and minus, so it's the best scenario for farmers that they has their own tencha processing facilities to grind their own matcha, but they has to mean more risk for them because they had to put more investment on that part. And most farmers especially in Kyoto, it's not really the large entity.

Gan · 16:17

So it means they has to put a lot more effort on this, the management on the on the tea trading, but they are really already busy with the tea farming anyway. So there are something that they can do and they cannot do in terms of economically or physically.

Gan · 16:38

So that is the place, the position that the blender can come up to balance that risk. So for the blenders, last year was a tough year, tough year for them. I, I believe because there are many, many blenders who, who would like to get the tencha, but the tencha is limited.

Gan · 17:00

So the price increases, which means that blenders must has a very, they have to spend more asset on the on the tea in order to get the same quality or the higher quality. Yeah. Especially the small scales blenders suffer the most I believe.

Gan · 17:24

Because they don't have the assets to purchase versus a thing like more. Likely to be big company or a company that has good relationship with farmers. Well, not all tea that was go through the auction in tea market. So they are the traditional way to to trade tea directly they call is.

Zongjun · 17:51

So that's based on relationship that has built for generation is not easy to cut and I think that is the most important thing that they valued in that industry. We heard that this last harvest season that because of these wholesale relationships, because the blend house sets the price for the tencha, so it's not a free market. We heard some farmers were selling tezumi, handpicked tea to blend houses for less money than machine cut wazuka tea was making at auction and then farmers weren't benefiting from the market price.

Gan · 18:37

Must lead to some interesting tension. This must be tension and yeah, we can we can foresee how they will react this year. If the farmers has more option, they will have more bargaining power in this market. Eventually. I would like farmers to be more well to get more benefit since they put a lot of effort in the tea. Blenders can make good tea because farmers put effort in it.

Zongjun · 19:11

We cannot magically make a very high quality tea without good quality materials. Material. Have you seen any efforts coming from the farmers side to trying to breakthrough this traditional like contract based transactions for example like may be forming an alliance of farmers or even their own auction houses? Like have you seen that happened before or do you think that will happened?

Gan · 19:41

There must be some alliance. And in terms of keeping relationship, I think they will continue send the tea to, to blenders. And they also would like to keep their own tea to maximize the, the, the profit to. But they don't have grinding facilities.

Gan · 20:02

So sometimes they have to to pay for the grinding fee for those who has grinding machines or grinding stone meal. And those people tends to be blenders. So it's kind of balance We would like like we would like them to grind our tea. But that when they also want to get matcha, want to get attention so special and we let you find the team, something like that.

Gan · 20:40

Yeah, well, and by son and camera really respect farmers. But we we produce not only only tencha, we also have matcha. But we don't we don't produce this from tencha. We saw this from farmers who to produce tencha and it sells a single origin as well. So even even by San Agora has to have to enter the matcha market. We the by San Agora, our passion was more about the tea leaves. Like sencha, we do have the raw tea leaf that is preserved by blast freezing and keep in the freezer and every time we can defrost it and produce sencha all year round so that our customer can bring the fresh tea all year round as a single origin and knowing who is the

Gan · 21:43

producers of that tea. We believe that with this way, people can know more about tea, not just only this Uji matcha. This is a matcha from Shizuoka. But not knowing who really produced it. Yeah. Interesting method. Yeah, quite.

Gan · 22:04

It's very. Uncommon it's I've never heard of anyone freezing wet leaf. If you came to by Sanakumara, you can see the tea bars and very small scale tea production machines right in the store and sometimes so cool meet the produce right away. Yeah, very interesting.

Ryan · 22:24

Did you, I'm, I'm mostly wondering like does the freezing process change the flavor of the tea at all? Or if it does, like, how do you work with this kind of change in processing? Well actually doesn't change that much. Well, we try to minimize the the oxygen because oxygen cause oxidization.

Gan · 22:49

So it has to be vacuum sealed and some nitrogen. It's also vacuum to to make it last longer. And when we make a vacuum feeling, if there's too much pressure on the TV, sometimes it's crushed them and, and make the TV quite hard to to to produce.

Gan · 23:11

So this know how is belongs to the owner of the bison governor, interestingly. So cool it's on Uji Main Street right? Or just off Uji Main St. It's on the Agata Rd. the same street with Horace Mann and Agatha. Trying OK.

Gan · 23:31

OK, Yeah, we need to come we. Should visit right? Yeah, will be there soon. Yeah, I think there is some. There's a question about what is Uji matcha and Uji doesn't really. Yes. From Uji right Well actually term is a registered trademark that has a definition that is can be tea that's growing 4 prefectures Kyoto, Nara, Mie and Shiga.

Gan · 24:02

But the the process of tencha processing like a sorting blending, grinding must be done in Kyoto Prefecture with some note that the proportion of Kyoto, the basic ingredients must be larger than orders prefectures For example, you can have 30% of you can a 30% of the tea that is blended maybe from Kyoto and auto 60 can be from three prefectures like 20/20/20 and you can label that as Uji matcha.

Gan · 24:41

So when we buy Uji matcha or Uji tea, sometimes it doesn't really from Uji but they also share the same knowledge and same know how how to produce tea. And in term of the culture, well the way of processing tea, this has something in common.

Ryan · 25:01

So in certain level, I think it's OK to say that the tea doesn't have to be from Uji to taste like Uji. We've heard some mixed opinions. Some people I think wish that Uji was protected so that you know, tencha grown in Gokasho or Shirakawa or Uji City, anywhere in proper Uji should have a protected status. I don't know what you would call it, like real Uji matcha, something like this.

Ryan · 25:33

That's single origin and that everything else is more like Uji style. We've heard many different opinions about this type of thing. We're curious what you've what opinions you've heard in Japan. Both you know your time preparing for the the Nihon Cha instructor program or talking with farmers or talking with people in Uji. Are they happy or unhappy about?

Gan · 26:00

And I'm sure there's a mix of opinions about the fact that Uji cha is so vague. There are opinions that we have heard from some blenders, this thing that if if we include too much. So why definition for the Uji matcha and customers including customers in Japan expect that Uji matcha must be the good quality and taste good. When in fact it doesn't taste good, they will disappointed. So they're afraid that that this broad definition may disappoint a customer.

Gan · 26:44

And sometimes they choose not to label the the product as Uji matcha because they think that's not in the quality that is satisfy them to to make it as Uji matcha of them would like Uji matcha to be in the position that anybody can satisfy with.

Gan · 27:05

So it's not really the case that they will include everything into as and Uji Matcha that so they can select to label it or not to and for the customer. There's many, many people who doesn't realize that Uji Matcha is not really from Uji.

Gan · 27:27

But for those people who really grown tea in Uji don't really know how they think about this definition. And they might say that they are from 100% like Uji City so that the customer can appreciate that and enjoy the tea that it's really from Uji. Even in the when the tea is not from Uji, we say it's from Joyo, it's from Wazuka, it's from other part of Kyoto. But when it's from Uji, we say it's from Uji. Interesting.

Ryan · 28:03

That's great. Yeah, well nowadays you see labels being hyper specific. Even you labeled the shading method, if it's honzu, if it's direct covered and the cultivar, like whether or not it's Asahi or Uji Hikari or if it's a zairai, you know, 100 year old zairai from from some places. Are you seeing, you know, like more and more tea houses in Uji adapting to this new kind of naming system, labeling system? And obviously you're, you are saying that Bisa is doing all these, you know, regional labeling for their tea. So I'm interested in knowing like what's the current trend happening in Uji?

Gan · 28:46

In Uji, I don't think that they're shifting into well, some some producer shift into this way of labeling their products because they want the products to be more specialty and the customer to But because customer, especially in overseas would like to know what is this matcha, where it's actually from and which county wise is? We are not only drink tea, but we would like to learn about it too, right?

Gan · 29:21

But in typical case, the tea is blended. So it's quite hard to tell what is the content of the blended because the blending was meant to maintain the same quality and same flavor profile. But the content of that can be adapt to reach certain quality that they pursue.

Gan · 29:44

So it doesn't mean that it has to be this cultivar all the time. So that makes them hesitate to leveling everything in that product. For the tea that is blended as a single origin, we cannot expect that area is going to be the same.

Ryan · 30:01

Yeah, different expectation I guess between blended and single origin product. I have a question. What what is the process of becoming a Nihoncha instructor? Like what do you have to do to obtain the certificate and what does the education entail? Is it a lot of tasting theory mix? Is there anything related to chanoyu or is it mostly just like tea itself?

Gan · 30:25

I don't have a good mental model. So about any Nihoncha instructor is the qualification that was that about 27 years ago when the industry that is not from the chanoyu part would like to come up with some qualification to certify a person that has a knowledge about tea itself. So there is many qualification in the same organization. There is a Nihoncha instructor, Nihoncha advisor and then Nihoncha kantei organized by Nihoncha Instructor Association. So for the Nihoncha instructor, you must pass the exam is that's a 2 exam writing exam and practical exam. If you don't pass writing exam, you can proceed to the practical exam.

Gan · 31:31

And in order to to pass the writing exam is highly recommended to take an Nihoncha instructor course. They will send you the textbook and some some tea samples so that you can learn about the content that might included in the in the writing exam. To make sure that everybody has the same standard standardized knowledge about tea in many aspects, we'd have to learn about history, about cultivation, about the processing health benefit, chemical substance in the tea and quality evaluation to have to pass that writing exam. And the volume is quite we change through years as grow bigger and bigger, which make it

Gan · 32:35

harder every year. So I recommend to take it as possible if you feel like when you pass the exam, when you pass the exam. You don't need to retake it. Well, yeah, you don't need to retake it. So probably about 70% of people who take the exam well don't pass the writing exam. Wow, wow, it's a high.

Gan · 33:00

Failure rate. Wow, OK. Because very detailed and for foreigners the most challenging is the Japanese language itself. Is it recommend to be able to read Japanese language as if you like Japanese person? Yeah, in order to I saw those informations.

Gan · 33:26

What would an example question be like? You don't have to give away that test, but I'm curious what kind of question would they ask you on this exam? Like how detailed is it? Oh, it's come with the same pattern actually. It has 100 questions, divide into one. 100. 100 question Divide into 10 chapters.

Gan · 33:50

You must in overall you must take over 70% of the score and to pass it. And the question traditionally be like which statements is wrong and every statement in the in the question seems correct. So it has to be really details to see you what which sentence or which detail is wrong, which required to know everything everything in that in that question interest. Would it be something like, you know this cultivar was registered in this year in this place and then it gives like different cultivars or like is it like very hyper specific knowledge or more like general theory questions? Oh, it's very specific.

Gan · 34:41

Sometimes you have to remember a number, like how many for example. About this we recall well. How many like tonnage of tea being produced in a county like in a specific? Year how many specific year, how many percent of tea that's being explored to a country or OK, well, I don't. Think it's.

Ryan · 35:09

Specific, but it feel like that's specific. OK. Interesting. Wow, a lot of memorization. I don't think you're going to pass that exam again if it has to take again. What is the practical part? Is it a blind tasting or is it brewing tea or what? What is the?

Gan · 35:29

What are they evaluating in the practical section? There's five thing you have to do in practical exam A four of them is about evaluating tea. You will have all of them are sencha and you will have to find trays of sencha like unrefined sencha and you have to tell which one was harvest first and which one was hours later and make that into order by washing and touching. And you have to do the same thing with the blended sencha and define which has higher quality and make that into audio 5.

Gan · 36:14

And you also have to cupping to do the cupping of sencha aracha to see which has the quite higher quality than an order in the order, which means if you make one wrong answer, the order must be wrong too. Well, yeah. It's like check up here actually the first one is quite easy actually. It just you have to tell what type of tea it is. There's a 10 type of tea is the most easiest part though that's some some tea that can be quite similar like Kabusecha and Gyokuro.

Gan · 36:56

And that is interview exam too. They will they will ask you some question and you have to ask question about tea and you have to answer it as an instructor who supposed to be able to to explain and instruct people about tea.

Gan · 37:18

For example, if you have to blend tea for for someone who could have sleep problem, how would you which tea will you blend it or how you blend it? How would you describe guilt road to finance something like that? Quite easy one. What is the other two levels?

Gan · 37:38

The instructor is the hardest one and for the advisor it will be more less intense in terms of the content and there is a writing exam only for the Nihoncha Kentei. The content includes will be more compact compared to Nihoncha Advisor exam. And you can also take this online too. And then we'll create you like Nihoncha Kentei has ikkyuu, nikyuu, sankyuu, grade 1, 2, 3.

Gan · 38:15

It depends on how many score you get in that exam. And for Nihoncha Advisor, if you take the Nihoncha Instructor course and complete the report which reads a certain score, you can apply for the Nihoncha Advisor without having an exam.

Gan · 38:34

OK. OK. Genius. Yeah. Do you know if they're going to offer it in English anytime in the future? I have heard a rumor 2 years ago that they are preparing for them English version but I have never see. Oh I wish the main.

Zongjun · 38:52

OK, I, I hope they there's hope. Yeah, there's hope, Ryan. I would, I would love to learn. And it's very hard to get reliable knowledge in English because a lot of the content marketing, a lot of the knowledge is content marketing where someone's trying to sell you tea and then you have to split the difference. OK, what do I believe?

Ryan · 39:19

What might be exaggerated? Where did this person get the information from? It's like a big research project just to know what to believe. It's. A huge task. Yeah. How would you like? So you're originally from from Thailand and we, we love Thailand's matcha scene.

Ryan · 39:41

We have been there 3 or 4 times just to learn about matcha and to learn what businesses are doing there. And it's a we actually think it might be the best place in the world to learn about matcha as a product because there's so much knowledge and people can describe it to you and like objective terms. Compared to like walking into a retail store in Japan where usually the person doesn't know very much about the product, How would you compare now that you're living in Japan in Kyoto and working in Uji, How would you compare and contrast the the Thai matcha culture and appreciation of it against the the Japanese culture of

Gan · 40:25

appreciating matcha? It was Japanese. The way of appreciating matcha is quite different from how people outside Japan, including Thailand created As a foreigners, we appreciate appreciate it as a drink or as an ingredient. So we would like to know exactly what how to evaluate this ingredient and how to use it.

Gan · 40:53

So there's a lot of people in Thailand pay pretty much effort in the learning about which water would be the best pairing with the surface specific tea or with what kind of the matcha itself, to which country wise, how it was grown and what is the best way to make it in each manual.

Gan · 41:16

Even for latte, what is the best ratio for doing things? This the how the order of making matcha latte could affect the taste. But we can't see any of this in Japan. I think it's because they already have the traditional way to to enjoy matcha as a part of chanoyu, which doesn't really come with the idea of which country why it is or how it was highways or when exactly it was highways in the spring, autumn, something like that.

Gan · 41:51

So they enjoy tea and altar, altar element in tea room too. And because of that, not many shop in Japan are doing matcha in the same way that foreigners are doing other country doing for Thailand. The field of matcha can be something that is more than a cup of usucha.

Gan · 42:18

Well, we do have many people who enjoy usucha especially who want to enjoy the tea as it is. We also blend matcha with coconut or with other local ingredients as well and put matcha into another interpretation, which I think it's with. It's quite interesting to see.

Gan · 42:44

But in Japan though, they have some structure, idea about how much ideas people, young people see matcha as something that is quite old, traditional and being enjoyed in people of chanoyu. So they don't see it as a modern drink of beverage.

Ryan · 43:05

That is the big gap, I believe, yeah. That makes sense. Interesting. You recently did a talk, I mean working with the famous author Kawabara-san, and he's obviously the author of the famous book. Great book by the way.

Gan · 43:23

I'm not like, as you know, in depth in the knowledge of Japanese language to read the original version, but they did a translation into traditional Chinese and published in Taiwan and I was reading that fantastic book. What is it like? I'm always curious about, you know, you know what, what what is Kawabara-san like in person? And can you maybe share a little bit more about, you know, his background and you know, how much do you know about him? I I met Mr. Kawabara last last year in March for an interview for my own research.

Gan · 43:59

So I don't really know him personally that that much, but Kawabara-san is very interesting people and very certainly knowledgeable. He loved to share knowledge and everything he knows about tea and he don't really care about how people in the industry would think if he's stayed that way, which is a great good thing. Mr. Kawabara has new book, actually last year it's not really new book.

Gan · 44:34

We usually publish his articles in the magazine called Cha or Tea published by a federation of tea industry during this 10 or 20 years. I don't have that book right here. So he just conclude that article into one book with with very extremely detailed about tea, sencha and matcha. It is the original taste that later become become the famous vocabulary.

Gan · 45:18

I recommend buying it. Interesting. It's a compilation of his works. Very cool. He and his family owns a tea shop, right? Yeah, he he is a tea blender. He has his matcha, the penta processing factory in Uji, but he doesn't have his own

Gan · 45:51

And he keeps telling everyone in Kyoto that Kyoto should position itself as a producer of high quality tea with the tea that only have in Uji, which is Uji rooted. He really has about the quality. Makes sense. That's great. I think quite a mixing, even other producer in Kyoto feel like they must produce a high quality tea because Kyoto is very small.

Gan · 46:23

So we do know that Kagoshima is the largest producer of sencha in terms of the amount. So Kyoto cannot compete with Kagoshima or Shizuoka for the scales. So the only way is quality. And when we see Japan overall, they don't have vast land like China.

Gan · 46:45

So if they would like to produce matcha competing with China, they have to come up with something that has the quality that only Japan can produce. It's a stretching way of thinking about how what to produce as Japanese makers of matcha. That makes sense.

Ryan · 47:06

And so sort of is one last question and all of your research and talking to all of these people, what are some of the most exciting things about the tea landscape or the matcha landscape that you've seen or learned about recently?

Gan · 47:19

Well, I think the most interesting things that I have found by from interviewing them is that all of them do not adapt to foreign market. They're not don't really feel that they has to adapt between markets. We don't feel that they have to make it organic.

Gan · 47:40

The organic cultivation is very hard in Kyoto because it has limitation for the lands. Even though they can't export it to Europe, if they have organic tea, they feel like that they already know how to produce matcha in a proper way.

Gan · 48:00

They don't want to change that the being themselves and try their best to adapt with the demand, for example, for increasing grinding capacity. But for the farming, there's a lack of manpower in this industry that includes farmers well. So no one expect that we're going to see more farmers in Kyoto.

Zongjun · 48:25

So they just try to, well, protect what they already have been doing for years. I think systematic slow change is not that bad. If they change too quickly, too fast and you know, the whole world decides that matcha was just a trend and they moved on to something else, it wasn't too much over investment. I think it's important to keep some traditions too and move slowly.

Zongjun · 48:49

I think there's some some merit in that and maybe they won't catch as much opportunity as, you know, people doing more innovative things like like new cultivars that are grown, you know, in places like Kagoshima or you know, other higher volume places that are more innovation forward, especially with regards to technology. But it's it's nice that you have both like, I think we need that. Yeah, well.

Gan · 49:17

That's an interesting perspective. Yeah, it's a interesting what has his own tradition. Tradition to to produce tea and I think it's better for Kyoto to keep what they are already good at. But at the same time, we can see the more development in terms of the farming technology or processing technology as we can see in Kagoshima, even the the tencha, the tencha processing right now in Kyoto, we usually see the the big structure on like. Yes. Tencha dryer right on the belt conveyor that's invented just 100 years ago or less than that. Yeah, it's.

Gan · 50:04

So in history it's great, pretty short. It was an innovation. So I'm quite open to any innovation that can improve the quality and can help farmer to to make the world more easy. Yeah, that makes sense because even ishi-usu were all hand turned 100 years ago.

Gan · 50:28

This idea of having a room of ishi-usus with a lot of air conditioners is actually quite a modern concept too. But it's quite modern in the old in the old way they have hand, you know, ishi-usu, right, which is much smaller than than what they already they currently have in factories.

Gan · 50:53

So we can expect that the matcha 100 more than 100 years ago or 200 years ago might taste different and the count you are too. You know, I have read books about almost the same K tissue reading and that is some phrase a sentence that described about koicha.

Gan · 51:18

His book had written in 1955 and the the master of Omotesenke say that koicha is the tea that's picked from 120 years old tree and usucha is picked more than over 50 years old of 30 years old tree so. Interesting. The farming must be very different from what we have seen now, so well, Kilzo has his own. Here it's the opposite.

Ryan · 52:00

Yeah. Because nowadays tea farmers only want young trees. We heard that after 25 years, some farmers RIP up the trees and plant new ones, right? Interesting. Surprised to know that too. Interesting indeed. And it was all the time, too.

Ryan · 52:20

This is a question that I've been wondering because we talked to some Uji matcha farmers and it sounds like around the 1970s, all of these very traditional plots of land with tea on it, they transitioned from zairai to cultivars.

Ryan · 52:38

And something I worry about is genetic diversity and protecting the genetic diversity. Do you know if people saved the genetic material of all of these zairai fields? Like even like maybe like Okonoyama tea garden, right?

Ryan · 52:55

At one point it was all zairai and now I don't know if it's Okonoyama cultivar or Narino cultivar, but at some point they tried to make the transition to remove all this old trees, zairai and I. Do you know if anyone saved those genetics as farmers were transitioning?

Gan · 53:13

Strictly speaking, to save all those genetic diversity 100% they have to. They have to keep all zairai in the past because zairai means it's a mix of different varieties. And when you turn a tea farm to to a single cultivar, it's mean that they all feel be gone and anywhere that has the zairai tea farm that's one would be remaining as a genetic heritage. So at least go though prefecture tea research might have this genetic heritage in their own plantation because they are working on the cultivation developing or the must has many cultivars including zairai as well. But yeah, it's quite rare to see

Gan · 54:06

the zairai tree in Kyoto and Uji. Does anyone still have it in Uji? Within Uji proper, are there any zairai fields? OK. There's zairai field because, well, I can give the name exactly, but OK, no worries. Yes even in Uji City. I just had a sencha that's made from zairai tree in Uji. The sencha in Uji is is pretty rare by itself because people only make matcha nowadays.

Ryan · 54:41

Yeah, we have heard about that like. Yeah, we heard there's only one farmer doing sencha in actual Uji. Is that right? Or is there more than one doing sencha in Uji proper? Only no one. Interesting. So all Uji sencha is really not from Uji at all, except with I guess this very rare exception. It's very, very rare.

Ryan · 55:03

Interesting. It's very interesting. Well, thank you so much for your time. We we learned so much and we really appreciate it. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you for having me today. I appreciate it. Our pleasure. Yeah, See you soon.

Zongjun · 55:19

See you soon. And thank you to our listeners as well. If you enjoyed this, please consider sharing with a friend and we'll see you on the next one. Thanks. See you in the future. See you.